SVdP Developing Future Registered Dietitians

Since 2012, The Family Wellness Program (FWP) at St. Vincent de Paul has helped five students and volunteers become Registered Dietitians (RD). In fact, SVdP has created an official RD internship program and is in the process of obtaining state accreditation to help more students become certified.

What’s unique about this is that Arizona has a low number of dietitians who have completed their certifications and actually stay to work in their communities. Hospitals and out-of-state job offers can be more enticing. In Phoenix especially, there is a need for these dietitians who are culturally sensitive, and even bilingual.

That’s where our Family Wellness Program wants to make a change. First, this program is invaluable to SVdP clients – as an intervention program, it provides education, life-improvement skills and medical and counseling services for adults, families and children who are at risk for diabetes or pre-diabetes. But it has proven to be valuable to its staff as well.

Elvia Madrid, SVdP Registered Dietitian and Arizona native, can speak to the success of this up and coming program. While pursuing an unrelated undergraduate degree, she worked part-time at SVdP as a Health Educator. She taught healthy-lifestyle classes to families and children, planned classes, created handouts, and wrote health articles.

After graduating she was anxious to see what opportunities were out there and began searching for other work.

“It was one of those things where when you leave a job, you realize what you had. I realized I loved talking about nutrition and helping people to better themselves. [It] was what prompted me to decide to pursue nutrition as a career,” she said.

She returned to St. Vincent de Paul and began the Nutrition Dietetics program at ASU.  After graduating, the final step was to apply for an RD internship program. This internship is similar to a doctor’s residency. Typically lasting for 9 to 11 months, students go through rotations lasting a few months at a time at different medical facilities.

But finding and getting accepted into an internship program is much harder than it sounds. The state of Arizona has less than 10 internship programs, yet public universities, in and out of state, have several hundred students each year looking to apply. And typically, only 5 to 10 students are accepted into each program every year. Needless to say, it’s a very competitive pursuit.  

“That’s why we want to make an internship program here at St. Vincent de Paul. We feel our program would be a great place to build future RDs and future health educators, especially for those who have limited choices.”

Fortunately for Elvia, she was accepted the first time around and completed her internship program through an out-of-state distance program from Iowa State University. Her coworkers and supervisors here at SVdP fully supported her during the internship.

“St. Vincent de Paul is the kind of place that will do whatever it can to help you get where you need to be.”

As of August 10, Elvia passed her state exam and became an official Registered Dietitian, and quickly resumed her full-time position at SVdP.

But things have changed. Now she does one-on-one consultations with patients, she determines a plan of treatment and mentors newer staff members. One thing that hasn’t changed is her reason for being here.

“I’ve always appreciated working here because no matter what department you’re in, we’re providing people with tools and opportunities that they might not have anywhere else. We’re not just telling patients to take their medications. We tell them to remember the ‘why’ behind the action. We don’t want to just put a Band-Aid on it. We want to give them the knowledge they need and help empower them to use that knowledge after they leave the clinic. That’s always been the most powerful thing for me.”

Currently, St. Vincent de Paul’s Family Wellness Program is collaborating with local partners to ensure the RD internship program is accredited, successful, sustainable, and encourages future dietitians to work within their communities.